Divided Loyalties
by servantofclio
Summary: The Lazarus Project had taken two years of Miranda Lawson's life and had accomplished the impossible. She didn't expect that working with the live Commander Shepard would prove to be her greatest challenge yet.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:** I got the idea for this story while writing an alphabet series (Life, Letter by Letter) on my main Shepard. In "R is for Resurrection," I tried to get into Miranda's head, and that made me wonder how Miranda's attitude toward Shepard might evolve over the course of the events of ME2. This story is consistent with that one, so you may want to give it a look to get a better sense of the Shepard that Miranda is reacting to here. However, I'll endeavor to make this story understandable without having read the other one.

* * *

Almost everything about Commander Shepard was right, and that gave Miranda a certain sense of satisfaction. The famous profile was intact, the gaze of the ocular implants was as sharp as the original organic eyes, she had the right height and athletic build (despite the extensive degradation of her skeleton and muscle tissue when the Lazarus Project began). She stood and crossed her arms over her chest and listened to Jacob and Miranda brief her with exactly the right tilt of the head and neutral expression. After two years of effort and experimentation, exhaustive research, wholesale invention of new procedures, and hours spent in reconstructive surgery, here she was. She should have been larger than life. Indeed, Miranda had observed the crew in the CIC casting her surreptitious looks, as if they couldn't quite believe they were in the presence of the legend.

For good reason, since the legend had spent several months clinically dead.

As usual, though, Miranda found herself focusing on the little things that were wrong. The way the cybernetic implants hadn't quite bonded properly with the organic tissues, for example, with the result that reddish fissures showed through the skin. It should have been satisfying to see Shepard dressed in the black and white uniforms that Cerberus had provided for the _Normandy_ crew, but the effect was subtly wrong, simply because Miranda was far more used to seeing the woman in combat armor or an Alliance uniform.

What was most unsettling was that Miranda couldn't quite tell what lay behind the carefully flat expression. To her, of all people, Shepard should not be a closed book. She had, after all, spent the better part of two years learning all about her. Grade school report cards, the reports of the team that had rescued her from Mindoir, psych evals, commendations; she'd studied footage of every public appearance the woman had ever made, from the tour she'd made as a twenty-two-year-old war hero after the Blitz, her Star of Terra shining on her chest, to her Spectre initiation, to every press interview she'd done. She'd read all the reports from the mission to catch Arterius. Other Cerberus personnel had discreetly interviewed many of the surviving crew, and Miranda had read those transcripts, as well. She'd interviewed Moreau herself, even though putting up with his constant distractions had been tedious in the extreme. She should know everything she needed to know, but she couldn't tell exactly what Shepard was thinking.

It left her very slightly off balance. Especially when Shepard was unexpectedly... agreeable. She clearly didn't like the presence of the AI, shackled or not, which Miranda completely understood. She inspected the entire ship and its crew with a cool, measuring glance. She accepted Miranda's advice that they should proceed to Omega and recruit Mordin Solus with no argument. Miranda had expected something... else, she supposed. Expected Shepard to make a show of her authority. She wasn't sure whether or not to be glad that she hadn't yet done so.

In the days it took them to get from the _Normandy_'s dock to Freedom's Progress, and then to Omega, Shepard showed agitation only once.

"Miranda," she said, her voice cold, "why is there a window over my bed?"

Miranda blinked, concealing her irritation. She hadn't been privy to all the details of the ship's design. "I can inquire—"

Shepard went on as if Miranda hadn't responded. "Because it's wonderful to have a view of the stars, as a general rule, but maybe not in the case of someone who was once _spaced._" The last word cracked like a whip. Miranda set her teeth.

"I'm sure the design was an oversight," she said, sure of no such thing.

EDI piped up, "It may be possible to fit the viewport with a cover."

"That would be appreciated," said Shepard, her voice once again cool and neutral. She turned to go.

Miranda ventured, "Perhaps you might discuss the situation with Yeoman Chambers?"

Shepard paused. Her shoulders stiffened. "I'll consider it."

Aside from that, Shepard quickly established a shipboard routine. She met with Miranda daily to review the recruitment dossiers and discuss any personnel issues. According to EDI, she spent much of her free time familiarizing herself with the events of the previous two years. She had also met Dr. Chakwas for a physical examination, spent several hours in workouts, and had spoken to every member of the crew at least once.

"She appears to be establishing a regular routine of rounds," the AI reported. "While she does not speak to each crew member daily, she speaks to each section head, and always spends extra time with Mr. Moreau, Dr. Chakwas, and Operative Taylor."

"Hm. Thank you, EDI." Miranda felt a little relieved. This behavior was well within observed behavioral paradigms. Interviews from _SSV Normandy_ crew members indicated that Shepard was unusually accessible to the crew. It was good that she was resuming her former routines. Perhaps she was simply accommodating herself to her new environment. Miranda could hardly complain if Shepard chose to do so without much fuss, after all, even if it left her waiting for the other combat boot to drop.

#

Omega, as usual, unsettled things.

Not at first. The mission to recruit Mordin Solus had gone as planned. Not precisely as planned—the dossier hadn't mentioned the plague zone, of course—but EDI's intelligence had been useful there. It had been a good test run, in fact, an opportunity for Shepard to shake off the rust after two years out of action. She had performed superbly, well within expected specifications; she and Miranda and Jacob had worked well together, in Miranda's estimation; and Mordin Solus was now installed in the science lab. Miranda was not pleased that he had already disabled half of the surveillance devices, but she couldn't say she was surprised. She _was_ a little bemused that he'd had the courtesy to bring the most expensive of the items back to her, presenting it politely and without comment before returning to the lab.

Miranda was in the process of compiling her report for the Illusive Man—a very satisfactory report, all in all—when Shepard appeared in her office door.

"Miranda, gear up. We're headed back to Omega."

"For?" she asked expectantly.

Shepard shot her a look, eyebrows pulled down. "I'd rather not wait on Archangel. There's not much time to waste, if we can believe Aria."

Miranda disliked leaving the report unfinished, but Shepard had a point, and she wasn't about to let Shepard see her discomfiture. She rose smoothly to her feet. "Who's our third?"

"Massani," Shepard said. "We'll see how well he'll follow orders, and his experience with merc operations might be useful."

Miranda nodded. It was a sound choice; she was rather curious to see the bounty hunter's skills herself, to tell the truth, considering how much Cerberus was paying him.

The mission parameters left something to be desired. To reach their target, they'd have to get past the mercs without drawing Archangel's fire. If Miranda had been leading the mission, she might have cut their losses at that point, but Shepard merely looked calculating. Miranda found herself devoting nearly as much attention to Shepard as to their surroundings. The commander explored the mercenary encampment apparently at random, and yet managed to ferret out a considerable quantity of intel, not to mention salvage and sabotage opportunities, as she did. She paused as they crossed behind the barricade at the end of the bridge, looking toward the balcony at the far end with narrowed eyes. Miranda followed her gaze, and made out a brief flash of blue. One of the mercenaries at the barricade fell, a hole between his eyes.

"Turian, I think," Miranda ventured as Shepard moved on without comment.

Massani grunted. "We going to do anything around here, Shepard?"

"Hold your horses, Massani," Shepard replied. "We're still getting the lay of the land."

Shepard chose their moment to turn on the mercenary coalition perfectly, waiting until they were halfway across the bridge to signal Miranda for an overload. It shorted out the electronics of the man setting explosives ahead of them, and Massani's shot took his head off. The bounty hunter was every bit as skilled as advertised, and, once the action had started, followed Shepard's lead without hesitation or complaint. The three of them made short work of the freelancers who had preceded them into Archangel's base, while, as far as Miranda could tell, managing to avoid Archangel's fire entirely. She supposed he must have realized they were allies rather than enemies; if he had failed to notice them at all, he would hardly be worth the effort of recruiting.

They pounded their way up the stairs, Shepard in the lead, still hearing the rhythmic crack of Archangel's rifle. Shepard made a cursory check of the rest of the second level before approaching the balcony and pausing in the doorway. "Archangel?"

The turian raised a hand briefly. Miranda's lips compressed. Arrogant, perhaps, or desperate, to leave his back turned to them. Shepard waited, however, while Archangel made one last shot before hauling himself to his feet. He moved stiffly, hampered by injury or fatigue, she presumed, and pulled his helmet off with one hand before settling heavily on a stack of crates, just out of line of sight from the window. "Shepard," he said. "I thought you were dead."

"Garrus!" Shepard exclaimed, stepping forward. Her arms lifted and paused, outstretched. "What are you doing here?"

Miranda had studied Shepard's dossier and associates too long not to recognize the turian's face as soon as he removed his helmet. Garrus Vakarian, formerly of C-Sec, missing since early in 2184. According to Moreau, he and Shepard had been close friends. Shepard's body language and tone of voice supported that assessment. Miranda reviewed what she could recall from the turian's file while the two talked. A C-Sec arrest record that was partially balanced by an impressive disciplinary record, with the black marks piling up extensively in the period between Shepard's death and his abrupt resignation. Though Shepard's AARs were typically terse and clinical, his name figured heavily in most of them. She'd also written a much more effusive commendation which had disappeared into the vaults of Council correspondence. Finding Vakarian here was unanticipated. If he could be persuaded to join them, however, he might be valuable for Shepard's emotional stability, as well as a tactical asset.

Shepard laughed at something Vakarian said—_laughed_—and Miranda, startled, took a closer look at her. There was still a bit of tension visible in the line of her neck and shoulders, but otherwise her demeanor was relaxed, a wide smile on her face, her eyes bright. Her eyes kept flicking back to the turian even as she spoke and surveyed their surroundings. Miranda wasn't sure she was even aware of it. This was a side of her Miranda hadn't seen before, even around Moreau; a far cry from the professional, but distant, commander she'd been since she boarded the _Normandy_.

What bothered Miranda more was that she hadn't seen this side of Shepard in her files, either. _Accessible_, her subordinates had called her, but this relaxed? In a combat situation that was still bordering on desperate? No. Miranda hoped that didn't mean she had missed something.

As for Vakarian, he devoted most of his attention to Shepard, but he'd given both Miranda and Massani a searching look with those pale predator eyes, and glanced back at them from time to time. No matter how exhausted he was, Miranda doubted he'd missed much. He'd been a skilled detective, and he had to have developed a substantial streak of paranoia merely to have survived this long as a vigilante on Omega. He would bear watching, no matter how useful he might be.

Unfortunately, the situation did not permit her the leisure to weigh the potential costs and benefits properly.

Dividing the team was not a bad move, precisely, but it wasn't the move Miranda would have made. She would have presumed that Archangel—Vakarian—could continue to hold the upper level, and that the team moving to the lower levels of the base would require maximum force and adaptability. That Shepard had chosen differently might speak of a streak of sentimentality on the commander's part, something Miranda found concerning. Having made the decision to divide her forces, however, Shepard's choice remained sound; Massani could join Vakarian at the sniper's nest he'd established, or switch to assault rifle and cover the turian's back, if necessary. Miranda's skills supported Shepard's and gave her options to cope with a variety of opposition.

As they headed down the stairs, Miranda considered, but couldn't stop herself from saying, "Shepard, are you sure it's wise to divide—"

Shepard cut her off with a single shake of her head. Her expression had settled back into combat concentration, but there was an extra furrow in her brow. "He's been up there for days, Miranda. We've come all this way to get him out, I don't want to lose him now to a stupid mistake."

Though Shepard wasn't looking at her, Miranda dipped her head. "Acknowledged, Commander."

The fighting on the lower level was hard, though not more than Miranda and Shepard together could handle; their opposition was largely Blood Pack, so it was mostly varren and vorcha, with the occasional krogan. Both of them were using their biotics hard; Miranda thought she could feel her amp growing warm from the repeated use of warp. Over to her right, Shepard suddenly shouted. Miranda felt a slight… crackle, the tell-tale rush of a dark energy discharge, and Shepard appeared much further down the length of the passage. She took out the vorcha in that area with a few incendiary shotgun blasts and slammed the controls with the palm of her hand. The gate shut with a clang. Shepard shook herself and called out, "What the hell was that?" as she strode back toward Miranda's position.

A successful test of the L5n implant. Miranda made a mental note to add to her report, saying, "I told you, Shepard. Experimental implants. That's a very risky tactic, though."

Shepard waved her off impatiently, heading back toward the junction of the three passageways, an almost feral grin spreading over her face. Then she tapped her comm. "One down, two to go. Garrus, Zaeed, you okay up there?"

"Holding," Massani grunted.

"Only one, Shepard? Slow work. You're slipping," said Vakarian.

A crooked smile spread over her face. "I've been out of commission."

The other two doors were easy, comparatively. As long as one didn't mind hurdling over barricades and avoiding vorcha with flamethrowers. Since Shepard took the lead, Miranda's task was to follow and support, bringing down their enemies' defenses where she could, and together they made short work of the mercs.

It was after they returned to the upper level that all hell broke loose.

Miranda was posted at the top of the stairs while the rest of the team took out the Blue Suns coming in through the windows. The Suns finally seemed to be thinning out when she thought she heard shouting from the direction of the balcony, followed by the roar of a rocket blast.

"_Garrus!_" Shepard's shout was loud enough to make Miranda's comm whine in protest. Sparing a glance downward, she dropped the last Suns trooper on the stairs with two shots from her pistol and bolted back toward the balcony.

The gunship. Shepard had killed the batarian mechanic—an act ruthless enough to surprise Miranda, but one she had approved of—but apparently the vehicle was operational. And Vakarian was down, Massani crouched behind a shredded piece of furniture, while Shepard had unslung the missile launcher. "Miranda," she snapped. "Warp on my mark."

Miranda slid into cover next to her. "Ready."

"Mark."

Miranda snapped upright and hit the gunship with the strongest warp field she could muster. Its armor buckled and cracked, and the engine stuttered. She dropped back down, Massani and Shepard rising in sync to hit the ship in its weak points.

Once they had it down, Shepard started toward Vakarian's body. "Call the _Normandy_, notify them—" She hesitated, her stride hitching. "See if you can get Chakwas on the line."

Miranda activated her comm. "Joker? It's Lawson. Patch me through to Dr. Chakwas, and have EDI send basic medical data on turians to my omni-tool."

"Turians? What—"

"Just do it," she said, in no mood for Moreau's usual antics. "It's an emergency. Also, we need a shuttle to our location ASAP, or have EDI scout the fastest route out of here." She spoke in an undertone, watching Shepard.

Joker said, "If your location's secure, we can get the shuttle to you in ten."

She glanced around briefly. Massani was watching the lower level. "It's secure."

"Dispatching shuttle and patching you through to Chakwas."

There was a lot of blood on the ground, shockingly blue. It looked like paint and had a sharp, metallic smell. Shepard had approached Vakarian's body and dropped to one knee, heedless of the spreading pool of blood, but then she hesitated, her hand hovering over his shoulder.

"Garrus?" Her voice came out strained.

He drew a breath, wet and rasping. Blood in his throat, or his lungs, Miranda noted. A swift scan with her omni-tool, comparing to the baseline data EDI had sent her, showed his vitals shaky, blood pressure dropping, pulse irregular. He clutched at his rifle; Miranda wasn't sure if it was a conscious movement or simply a spasm. She frowned at the readings on her omni-tool, and started to speak, but Massani beat her to it.

"He's not going to make it."

Shepard flared, suddenly wreathed in dark energy, and glared up at Massani with teeth bared, her eyes so wide the whites showed all the way around the iris. "Shut up," she growled, "and give me all the medi-gel you've got."

He complied, with a sour expression, but he kept his mouth shut. Miranda gestured at him to keep watch. He gave both her and Shepard a dismissive look, but did as instructed.

"Ms. Lawson?" came Dr. Chakwas's voice in her ear. "What's the situation?"

"We have a turian male with significant trauma to the head—are you getting the data from my omni-tool?"

"Yes," the doctor confirmed.

"Let me talk to her," said Shepard. She'd damped the flare, and now knelt with one hand on Vakarian's armored shoulder, her expression tight.

Miranda redirected the comm line. "Shuttle arrival in six, Shepard," she said.

Shepard nodded, speaking quietly into the comm without taking her eyes from the turian. "It's Garrus. Yeah. A rocket. I don't—" She took a deep breath. Too controlled to be a sob, but nearly on the edge. "Okay. Yes. The bleeding's slowed, but not stopped."

Miranda took a step back, considering. Vakarian's vitals were stabilizing somewhat, but could hardly be called good. Shepard was more agitated than Miranda would have expected. None of the crew reports from the previous mission indicated a reaction like this to the deaths of Richard Jenkins or Ashley Williams. Perhaps it was that Vakarian wasn't yet dead; perhaps it was a reaction to the isolation of her environment. Miranda knew perfectly well that was a strain. It was designed to be. Her lips pursed. In a way, this might be the best possible outcome; Vakarian might be sufficiently disabled to prevent any interference with ground missions, but still able to provide tactical advice and psychological support to the commander.

Assuming he actually survived, that was. She was concerned how Shepard might react if he didn't.

Mercifully, the shuttle arrived only moments later.

#

Shepard stayed in crisis mode, firm and controlled, though pale, until Drs. Chakwas and Solus took charge of their patient and the medbay door closed behind them. Then she stopped in her tracks and stared at the unrevealing door, her arms falling slack to her sides.

Miranda waited, unsure whether to approach; Shepard showed no signs of moving, so after a few minutes she said, cautiously, "Commander?"

Shepard blinked and turned toward her. "Miranda." She swiped a hand across her forehead, leaving an indigo streak, and paled as she looked at her blood-smeared gauntlets. "Can we postpone the debrief? I need to clean up."

Miranda considered saying a number of things. Some comfort or reassurance about the doctors' abilities, perhaps; but she did not believe in offering false hope, and the turian's condition looked bad even with their excellent medical team. There was also a good chance Shepard would see any such comment as presumptuous. She settled for saying, "Of course, Shepard."

Shepard replied with a jerky nod before she headed for the elevator. Miranda watched her go, considering, before returning to her office.

"EDI."

"Yes, Operative Lawson?"

"Is Shepard in her quarters?"

"Yes, Operative Lawson."

"Please inform me if she shows any unusual behaviors."

There was a pause. "Commander Shepard has issued orders that I am not to inform anyone of what happens in her quarters without her permission. I am afraid her orders supersede yours, Operative Lawson."

Miranda ground her teeth. There were emergency protocols in place that would allow EDI to override such orders—but only if Shepard proved to be a danger to herself. She would have to be content with that. "Very well, EDI."

"Logging you out."

Frowning, Miranda settled down to finish both her mission reports.

#


	2. Chapter 2

It developed over the next few hours that Vakarian would survive.

He survived the initial surgery, at least. Dr. Chakwas's preliminary report described extensive and creative reconstruction of the right side of his face, though after the Lazarus Project, it took a great deal more than that for Miranda to be impressed. Dr. Chakwas also cautioned that there was still risk of infection and implant rejection, and she was keeping the turian largely sedated for perhaps a day while the grafts and cybernetics did their initial bonding. Miranda asked the doctor to send her updates as the patient progressed and regained consciousness. In the meantime, she reviewed all the information on Vakarian she could get her hands on. What she found gave her a sense of how the turian might best be utilized in the _Normandy_'s crew, but also gave her concerns. He had a long record of being unpredictable and insubordinate—by turian standards, at least. Shepard, however, had had nothing but praise for him, and his conduct on the SR-1 had apparently been exemplary, including surprisingly good relations with the rest of the crew. He'd clearly fit in well with Shepard's _modus operandi_. Still, Miranda thought he might be a disruptive element in the delicate chemistry of _this_ crew. Though nominally humanity's allies, turians typically had a rivalry with humans. Vakarian's military and police experience were potentially useful, and yet at odds with both Cerberus and Alliance protocols. Beyond that, Miranda couldn't be certain that he'd stay with the crew, especially taking into account his species and Cerberus's record... and what would _that_ do to Shepard's mood? Her demeanor had changed so drastically on Omega once she recognized him, and again when he was injured. After delivering him to the medical team, Shepard had eventually emerged from her quarters cleaned up but still noticeably tense, and it didn't appear that she had slept at all well. She'd visited the medbay as soon as she and Miranda finished debriefing, and she emerged a short time later with her lips pressed together and her entire posture tight.

In the draft of her mission report to the Illusive Man, currently occupying her terminal screen, Miranda had cautiously outlined her concerns. Vakarian had the potential to be either a stabilizing force on Shepard, or a very destabilizing one. It remained to be seen, too, how well he would recover from his injuries. Miranda frowned at the screen. At one point, before Shepard was revived, she had hoped to locate the turian. His disappearance had been annoying. Now, though... as much as possible, she liked to control the variables surrounding her, and the turian was a significant one. She needed to speak to Vakarian herself, Miranda concluded. Preferably before Shepard did, so she could be the one to brief him on the mission, and so she could assess his reactions without Shepard's interference.

* * *

"Well, Dr. Chakwas, how's our patient?"

It was an unfamiliar voice, female, presumably human. No, wait—slightly familiar. A woman had been with Shepard on Omega. Long dark hair, wearing the Cerberus emblem. From his bed in medbay, Garrus kept his eyes shut and listened.

"Garrus is recovering well," said Dr. Chakwas. "The cybernetics are integrating beautifully."

The right side of his head throbbed as she spoke. Pain was still a great improvement on the hollow numbness he'd felt the first time he woke up—he wasn't sure how long before.

He'd come awake and opened his eyes blearily, taking in that he was somewhere clean and white—so probably not Omega—and that his head had a floaty not-quite-there quality.

"There you are," a familiar voice had said. "Welcome back to the land of the living."

Garrus had blinked, befuddled, at the gray-haired human in front of him. He recognized her at once, but it seemed dream-like, not real. For one thing, the sound felt... wrong. Much louder on his left than on his right. Maybe he was hallucinating the _Normandy_. Or maybe he'd never left the _Normandy_, which meant that everything since then hadn't... that thought gave him an odd combination of relief and panic. "Doc—" he started to say, but pain slashed through the right side of his jaw and head as he spoke.

Well, crap. That was definitely real. And now that he thought about it, he became aware of a number of dull aches elsewhere in his body. Which probably meant that some of the less pleasant portions of his memories were also real.

"Don't try to talk," Dr. Chakwas was saying, in her familiar calm, firm tone. "You've been very seriously injured. You were struck with a missile."

Damn. Now he _remembered_. The gunship. Again. Coming around for a second try. Dr. Chakwas was still talking, describing the extent of his injuries—something about _synthetic aural implant_ and _cybernetic augmentation to damaged nerve and muscle fibers_—but Garrus was only half listening. Ha, half listening. Memory came back to him in a rush: the roar of the gunship's engines and that ass Tarak's taunting, the artificial alertness brought about by stim use, on top of the deep fatigue from fighting alone for days—

—except he hadn't been alone when the gunship came back, he'd been with—

"Shep-" he got out, pressing past the lancing pain.

"Shepard's fine," said Dr. Chakwas with authority.

"Nuh," he said. "Deh." He swallowed, steeling himself for what he knew was going to hurt, and enunciated carefully: "Dead."

Dr. Chakwas drew closer, shaking her head. She checked the monitors beside his bed and then settled herself in the chair, meeting his eyes calmly. "She's not. She's here." She allowed herself a small smile. "She'd be _right_ here, in fact, but she was fidgeting so much I wouldn't let her stay. She's quite worried about you."

Shepard. Worried. About him. He could remember, just, the sound of her voice shouting his name. He could remember, a little more vividly, the look on her face when she recognized him. All the wrong scars on her face, but the smile was hers, her lips spreading wide, arms flung open, eyes shining. She'd looked so happy to see him, and he...

... he'd fucked up. Badly, this time, badly enough to lose the entire team. The sense of failure, the memory of the stench of blood and death, rose up and seemed to lodge in his throat and gut. The room tilted, and he closed his eyes against the vertigo. Shepard had bailed him out again. Lucky him. At least that meant he had the chance to put things right, to find Sidonis and make him pay.

Garrus realized he was making a harsh, discordant sound in his throat, while Dr. Chakwas was still watching him steadily. He shook his head. That hurt, too. Everything was starting to feel blurred around the edges, but he knew Shepard wasn't supposed to be alive. He started to ask _How?_ and winced.

"I told you not to talk," Dr. Chakwas said. "You need to let your jaw heal and allow the cybernetics to integrate with your nervous system. Once that happens, you should be able to speak normally. You should have normal motor function in your right arm and shoulder, too, although we'll need to monitor that for a while."

Garrus nodded, even though the motion made his neck ache. Dr. Chakwas frowned at him. "Stop moving around," she said, and then sighed. "I suppose you'd like an explanation. It appears that Shepard's body was recovered and... revived... by Cerberus."

Damn it. He knew he'd recognized that emblem, he'd just been too tired to place it. He hissed and tried to sit up, only to find the doctor pushing him firmly back down into the bed. "None of that," she said. "She's not in immediate danger, and neither are you. They've asked her to take on a mission; there are colonies going missing."

He knew Shepard well enough to know that would be a call she couldn't resist, regardless of Cerberus's history. Everything seemed more fuzzy now, and Dr. Chakwas's voice sounded hollow as she kept talking, the words indistinct, and he closed his eyes.

He had woken up another time or two since then, let the doctor do her tests and continue explaining to him, in a low voice, what the situation was. It was a lot to take in. He had yet to see Shepard. Dr. Chakwas said she'd stopped by, but only when he was asleep. As if she were a dream, or a mirage.

And now this stranger was here, asking Dr. Chakwas questions.

"Can I speak to him?"

The doctor took a moment to respond. "Briefly," she said. "If he's awake."

Footsteps approached, clicking against the deck. Garrus considered feigning sleep, but reasoned that he might learn more by talking with the woman. He opened his eyes when the footsteps stopped.

She was tall and composed, long dark hair falling over her shoulders in smooth waves. Shepard always wore hers up, he found himself thinking, irrelevantly. He couldn't read much from this woman's expression, though her eyes were sharp.

"Garrus Vakarian," she said. "We'd been looking for you."

"You mean Cerberus," he replied, pleased that the words came out clearly, with only a little pain at the hinge of his jaw and mandible. Whatever Chakwas was giving him was good.

She nodded once. "You're a hard man to locate. We didn't realize you were Archangel."

Garrus wondered why this was the first thing she thought he should know. "That was the idea," he said.

The corners of her mouth turned up, just a little. "I'm sorry. I should introduce myself. I'm Miranda Lawson. I'm the Executive Officer here on the _Normandy_."

He looked up at the white ceiling, remembering Pressly. The veteran officer hadn't given his respect lightly to the non-human crew, but he'd given it, in the end. An honorable man. "The _Normandy_."

"Shepard's choice of a name. Cerberus built the ship, making some improvements on the SR-1's design."

Garrus's estimation of Cerberus's resources went up a few notches. Top-of-the-line warships, even frigates, were not cheap, and the _Normandy_'s specialized stealth features sent the cost higher. He noted Lawson's words, too. How many choices had Shepard been given? Little things, maybe, like naming ships, and not anything that mattered. Anger coiled inside him, but he kept it leashed. Controlled. He might not be in enemy hands, but he wasn't entirely in friendly hands, either. Best to keep control, watch and listen, and learn something. Humans often complained that they had trouble reading turians; he could use that to his advantage. He gave Lawson his blandest expression. "Cerberus must have invested a lot in this mission."

"Indeed." She regarded him coolly. "I'd like to give you a briefing on the mission, if you have time."

A dry laugh escaped him. What else, exactly, did he have to do with his time at the moment? "Fire away," he said.

Unlike Dr. Chakwas, Lawson remained standing, forcing him to look up. He recognized the ploy: she was establishing herself as an authority. Garrus was certain that, if he were on his feet, he'd be the taller, reversing their positions. "Human colonies have been disappearing," she said. "Buildings and objects remain, but the populations vanish. The Council won't respond because the settlements are in the Terminus Systems."

Garrus nodded. He might have spent most of the last two years on Omega, but the colony disappearances had been news, and he hadn't forgotten galactic politics. It wasn't as if the Council had changed much, in spite of all the councilors being new. "And the Alliance?"

Her brows drew together, and her shoulders rose and fell. "If they are taking any measures, they've been ineffective. We believe the disappearances are connected to the Reapers."

"We meaning Cerberus."

"That's correct."

"What does Shepard think?" he asked, idly flexing his right hand. Chakwas had warned him that manual dexterity might be compromised for a time, but it felt all right.

"You'd have to ask her that," Lawson replied.

"I intend to."

He watched her closely, wishing he had the additional data from his visor. Lawson smiled slightly. "We do have evidence, from the most recent colony disappearance, that Collectors are involved."

Garrus had to fight to control his expression at that one. "Collectors," he said, knowing his voice resonated with disbelief and wondering if Lawson could tell.

She gave him a sharp nod. "That's correct. They appeared to be disabling and abducting the colonists."

"What would Collectors want with so many humans?"

"That's what we mean to find out," Lawson returned coolly. She appeared completely serious. "I can make the video footage available to you, if you wish to review it. I assure you, you'll find no signs of tampering on our part."

Garrus nodded slowly. "I see." He did. Unwillingly, he could see how this was going to go. Missing human colonists; the Council refusing to see beyond the confines of the Citadel, as usual; Cerberus, a self-proclaimed mouthpiece for humanity, investigating. Shepard in the middle, and, if he knew her at all... if it really and truly _was_ her... she wouldn't turn her back on this.

Lawson continued, "We'd like to hire you for the duration of the mission. Details of the contract will be sent to your omni-tool."

He wanted to laugh. A contract, as if this were a regular sort of transaction. As if chasing down the Collectors wasn't likely to be a one-way trip. He said, "Didn't know Cerberus was in the habit of hiring turians."

"We're not," Lawson said, "but Shepard is certainly in the habit of working with turians. Specifically, of working with you. You would, of course, report directly to Shepard as your commanding officer."

"Of course," he said, matching her matter-of-fact tone. "And what would be my duties?"

"That would be at the Commander's discretion," she said. "She selects her own ground team. As far as shipboard duties go, the ship is in need of a gunnery officer, and your service record appears to fit the bill, so that would be my recommendation as Executive Officer. Any combat duties would have to be medically cleared, of course."

They both looked at Dr. Chakwas, who was ostensibly working at her desk, her back to them, but who could hardly avoid hearing the conversation. Garrus turned his attention back to Lawson and said, "I'd like to discuss that with Shepard."

She nodded. "Of course. And I'll leave you to your recovery now."

Garrus stared at the ceiling again as the sharp sound of her heels on the floor retreated, and the door whooshed open and shut. In the quiet left by Lawson's absence, he considered.

He still hadn't ruled out the possibility that it wasn't really Shepard. He remembered the sense of conviction he'd had back on Omega, but... he knew he'd been too exhausted then for his judgment to be entirely trustworthy. _As if his judgment was ever one to rely on_, said a little voice in the back of his mind, but he pushed it away. If it wasn't really Shepard, he needed to do something about it. And if it _was_...

It took an effort, but Garrus levered himself up and set his feet on the floor. He waited while his head swam. No worse than any other occasion when he'd been prone for a while, really. It cleared after a moment, and he pushed himself upright.

"And what do you think you're doing?" Dr. Chakwas asked.

Garrus stretched, cautiously, taking a few steps to test out his limbs. Everything worked, more or less, though there was a dull ache on his right side that was probably going to blossom into something much worse when the painkillers wore off. "I need to talk to Shepard."

"I can ask her to come here."

Looking around, he located his gear, stacked in the corner of the room. Cleaned, even, although still pitted and scorched, and that was a hell of a hole in the cowl armor, wasn't it? "If it's all the same to you, I'd rather report to my commanding officer on my feet and ready for action." He slipped the visor into place as he spoke and keyed it on, relieved as the familiar interface sprang to life. It seemed undamaged; good.

He heard a rustle as the doctor moved behind him. "I have to recommend against your leaving this sickbay. I would rather keep you here for at least another 24 hours of observation. And then you'll be released to _light_ duty only. No combat."

Garrus donned his armor anyway, piece by piece. The routine was so well-known that his hands did it automatically, and the familiar actions soothed the knot of tension in his gut. "Come on, doc. Do you really want to send her out there with nothing but Cerberus back-up?" Lawson, he was certain, was trying to figure out how to make use of him, but would be much happier if he were stuck shipside. There was no way he was going to let that happen.

He settled the last piece of armor into place and turned. Dr. Chakwas regarded him with her lips tight and her brow creased. He looked at her, searching for the right words that would make her see what was so clear to him: that he needed to be free to move, to act, to help Shepard however she needed it.

He didn't know what she saw on his face, but her expression shifted, and she held out a vial. "Fine. Take these as needed for the pain. Not more than every two hours. And you _will_ check in with me every six hours, or this agreement of ours is canceled."

It was a small price to pay. He took the bottle from her and slid it into a compartment, managing a painful, uneven smile. "Thanks, doc."

"You owe me," she said as he headed toward the door.

"I do," he agreed, and hesitated as the door opened. "Ah... where am I going?"

A small blue sphere sprang into existence near the door, and a synthesized voice said, "Commander Shepard is in the briefing room—"

"Thank you, EDI," said Dr. Chakwas. "That will be all."

"Ship's VI?"

"AI. I already told you that, Garrus."

"Right. I forgot." He remembered now; he just hadn't been entirely with it _then_. "And the briefing room is where?"

Dr. Chakwas gave him directions with a close look. He was fine, though. He was sure of it. He was fine and he needed to see Shepard for himself and hear from _her_ mouth what she thought was going on.

He passed through the ship, feigning confidence. The place was too bright and full of an AI, and crewed by humans in black and white who eyed him as he went by, some of them surreptitiously, some of them gawking openly. He noted everything he could, scanned and recorded the walk with his visor for further assessment later, the kind of habit he'd developed on Omega.

He didn't relax, not really, until he'd reached the briefing room and saw Shepard, saw her face light up—again—with that brilliant smile. For him. He _shouldn't_ relax, not on a Cerberus ship with a crew of unknowns. But face to face with Shepard, her smile wide and her eyes shining, he couldn't help but feel calmer. Lighter. Something in his chest that had been tight and knotted for a long time—maybe years—seemed to loosen. He ought to be more suspicious of her, probably, but her presence disarmed him. The look of her, the way her stance relaxed when she saw him, the biometric data his visor supplied, the sound and scent and presence of her, the indefinable and indomitable aura she carried with her, in combat or out of it—it added up too well, and he couldn't believe her to be anything but genuine. And if she was genuine, if she was here, she had to have reasons, and the least he could do was to hear her out.

They traded jokes. He listened to her laugh and watched her face grow serious as she spoke about the mission. She wasn't discounting the Cerberus risk, at least, and that, too, eased him. He was in, he knew it, and he told her so, passing it off as another joke, the words coming out almost before he'd made the conscious decision.

The AI popped up again as Garrus departed, directing him to the forward battery with no further comment. He took a deep breath as the doors shut behind him, confronting familiar machinery, and called up the schematics on the console. Better than the first _Normandy_'s armaments, but maybe not good enough. He frowned, ignoring the dull twinge on his right side, and made some notes. He knew that he was distracting himself. If he sunk himself into this project, he didn't have to think about the mess he'd left behind on Omega. The one he'd made. Damn, had he really called his father from his holdout? He should call him back, say he was all right. And Solana, too. And he should call some contacts, try to track down Lantar Sidonis. And then...

His hand shook as he made the note. Not now; he wasn't ready to think about any of it yet. He returned his attention to the cannon: a clean, mechanical problem, one that had an optimum solution. He only had to find it.

* * *

Miranda reflected on her conversation with the turian as she returned to her office. The rocket blast didn't seem to have damaged his mental faculties, at least. He asked sensible questions, and he was clearly listening and taking in information carefully. He wasn't stupid; his record spoke clearly of intelligence and good tactical sense, and her observation of him on Omega confirmed that. Foolishly idealistic, possibly a touch naive, but not stupid.

He'd let himself get boxed in, though. Miranda would have expected a turian to attempt to escape, perhaps planting explosives in the base and luring his enemies in while he made his getaway. The fact that he'd allowed himself to be cornered, as he had, was disquieting, speaking of some degree of emotional dysfunction. Perhaps he had not been thinking clearly after losing his team, but she did not view that as an entirely adequate excuse. She'd have to advise Chambers to keep an eye on him. She had little doubt that Dr. Chakwas and Shepard would both be doing the same.

It was more difficult to read his reactions. Turians' rigid, mask-like faces didn't easily betray emotions as human faces might, and Miranda was sure Vakarian had deliberately kept himself under tight control. She couldn't be sure what he was thinking. Nonetheless, he was appearing to be a good deal more cooperative than she'd expected. He'd hardly balked at the mention of Cerberus, and appeared inclined to join the mission. That was a positive development, on the whole; Miranda thought Shepard would function better with him available, even if only as a confidant. He was still something of an unpredictable element, however. His actions on Omega certainly gave evidence of recklessness, but perhaps his loyalty to Shepard would keep him in line. It would presumably be some time before he'd be cleared for active duty, in any case.

Dr. Chakwas's recommendation came to Miranda's terminal less than half an hour later, though, much to her surprise. Her own observation had suggested that the turian, while lucid, was not nearly in combat-ready condition. She called the doctor to her office.

"You cleared Vakarian for field duty starting tomorrow?"

Dr. Chakwas looked back at her calmly, unblinking. "I did."

"Are you sure that's wise? By your own report, he was in major surgery less than a day ago."

The doctor raised her eyebrows ever so slightly. "Are you questioning my medical judgment, Miranda?"

Her tone was forbidding, but Miranda had no intention of allowing the older woman to intimidate her. "An impaired operative is a risk to the entire team, as you well know, doctor."

"Turians are made of tougher stuff than humans." Dr. Chakwas crossed her arms. "I will be continuing to monitor Garrus's condition, of course, to make sure no complications from the surgery or the augmentation process arise, but he should be fully fit for combat within twenty-four hours. I've released him to shipboard duty until that time. In fact, I believe he's already working at the gunnery emplacement, as you suggested."

Miranda narrowed her eyes. Dr. Chakwas's return gaze was perfectly placid. Her face gave nothing away.

Miranda wondered briefly if she could get Mordin to render a second opinion. She dismissed the notion almost immediately, however. There was little point in sowing dissension between the chief medical officer and the chief scientist, and she didn't want to distract the salarian from his research into Collector tech. "Very well. Thank you for your time, doctor."

She could only hope whatever game they were playing, likely out of loyalty or misplaced paranoia, wouldn't put Shepard, or the mission, at risk.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Updates probably won't appear for at least two weeks, possibly a bit longer, as I'll be out of town for a while. Also, if much of this text looks vaguely familiar, Garrus' portion of the chapter was previously posted on my tumblr as a short story with the "Rude Awakening."


	3. Chapter 3

Maybe an hour or two after he saw her in the briefing room, Shepard came down to the battery. "Hey, Garrus. You got a minute?"

Garrus turned around, startled by the scrape of the door opening. "Yeah. Of course. Just getting familiar with the systems."

She smiled, the kind that didn't show any teeth, sat down on the crate of supplies, and talked. She explained the mission to him all over again. Garrus listened, head tilted to one side, still getting used to the way the synthetic implant on his right side filtered sound. He listened and compared the three versions of this story he'd heard: what Chakwas had said vs. what Lawson had said vs. what Shepard was saying now. Preposterous as the whole story was, with its Collectors and shadowy organizations and multi-billion-credit resurrection projects, the pieces all added up. That wasn't to say there wasn't something being held back, especially on Lawson's end, but it was a consistent story. Shepard was telling the truth, he concluded, or at least, what she thought was true. She wasn't going into this entirely naively, either; she seemed aware that Cerberus was manipulating the situation, and probably her. He wasn't quite sure how he fit into that picture.

Garrus frowned as Shepard confessed her uncertainty. "The Illusive Man said it was up to me whether to take on the mission, but I don't know that I believe him. Four billion credits they supposedly spent on me, who knows how much on the ship and the crew, and then... what? If I say no, I won't do it, they just drop me off on the Citadel? I doubt it."

He felt a surge of anger and curled his hand into a fist to keep it from shaking. "Shepard, if you want to jump ship, we'll find a way."

She started for a second. Her smile and her eyes both grew wider, even though she was already shaking her head. "Not yet. If it's true that the Collectors are taking the colonists, I need to know if there really is a Reaper connection. I need to see it through."

"I can understand that." He hesitated. The next subject he wasn't sure if he should bring up at all, but it seemed stranger to leave it unsaid. He'd said it when he first saw her: _I thought you were dead_. They hadn't followed up. "Shepard, you've talked a lot about the mission, but what about you? The reports said..." The words died. He'd heard Joker's version of events, and Kaidan's, and gone over the other reports, creating for himself a brutal picture of what must have happened.

Her smile abruptly died. She seemed to draw in on herself, her shoulders hunched and her arms folded across her chest. "That I was spaced? Yeah. I remember the explosion."

Garrus stared at her, shocked, a curse slipping out of his mouth without thought. Shepard went on, "My O2 line was damaged. It... vented pretty quickly."

"I'm sorry I asked," he said, damning himself for his thoughtlessness. Maybe the painkillers had left him not entirely clear-headed, after all, or maybe he simply hadn't expected her to _remember_.

"It's all right," she said quicky, as if she were trying to reassure _him_. "The next thing I remember is waking up in the lab. That was just a few days ago. I know it sounds ridiculous to say they brought me back from the dead, but... I think I was in pretty bad shape. I don't remember..."

Her gaze was distant and troubled, drifting somewhere over his shoulder. He sought something to say to shake her out of whatever bad memory. "You're here now." She blinked and refocused on him as he continued, "You're alive now. The rest of it doesn't matter."

His voice was a little too loud. She blinked a couple more times as the echo died. She was looking straight at him now, and he stared back, as if he could keep her from sliding away through force of will. "Thanks, Garrus," she said, and stood, rolling her shoulders. "So, we'll cut the Cerberus leash eventually, but for now we'll play along, if you're up for the ride."

He relaxed now that she seemed more like herself again. "Hey, I was promised a walk into hell. You'd better not disappoint, Shepard."

She gave him another smile. "Never. I'll let you get back to work for now, though."

Garrus turned back to the console once Shepard had left, but he paused for a moment to consider before returning to work. She looked so... pleased to see him. Happy with the meager bits of reassurance he could give her. It made him feel twitchy. Obviously, if it meant that much to her to have him stay, there was no question. He wasn't going to repeat his mistake and turn his back. If anything happened to her as a result, he'd never forgive himself.

No, he wasn't walking away. Chances were, none of them were walking away at the end of this mission, either. Maybe Shepard would find a way, somehow, but... whatever happened, he needed not to screw this up. He'd be damned if he let Shepard down.

It didn't take long to slip into a routine. He checked in with Chakwas as instructed, enduring her prodding. Apparently his injuries were healing well, at least. He checked the battery for bugs, and put out some feelers with contacts about Sidonis and a couple of other matters that Shepard asked him to look into. She stopped by a couple of times a day. They talked about the ship's armaments; his contact in Hierarchy weapons development got back to him remarkably quickly, and even agreed to slip him plans for a cannon that made him feel a _lot_ better about the prospect taking on a Collector ship. Shepard coaxed him into talking about his team, too. Garrus knew he'd promised to tell her the whole story, back at the base, but now that he was here on the _Normandy_, he found himself holding the details close. Shepard listened with a calm, open gaze, but even that seemed able to lay him bare. Who they'd all been, what they'd done together... those were things he wasn't ready to submit to another's judgment. Being on the ship itself made Omega seem a little blurry around the edges, like some kind of fever dream. She didn't push, at least. Much.

Shepard called him out for a couple of minor missions, too. It was... comfortable, familiar to fall into his old place watching her back, picking off the enemies at her flank as she pushed ahead. A bit of a relief, even, to let her take the lead and make the judgment calls; even a pleasure to come back from a job well done, with Shepard laughing and smiling and slapping him on the shoulder.

He didn't relax entirely. He knew by now not to let his guard down. But the Cerberus crew mostly left him alone, even Lawson, and Shepard kept stopping by with a smile, and he found he could breathe a little easier, after all.

* * *

After they left Omega, Miranda kept an eye out for dissension within the crew. Any of the new arrivals—Massani, Mordin, or Vakarian—might cause disruptions or difficulties.

Matters went rather better than she'd expected, though. Each settled in to his place. Massani seemed content to camp out on the lower level, leaving the engineering crew alone and emerging mostly for meals. The salarian and the turian, similarly, staked out their spaces and largely stayed there. Salarians, she knew, slept little; she'd installed a cot in the science lab, which seemed to suffice for Mordin's needs. Vakarian, too, requested a cot to be placed in the battery. Miranda was perfectly content to provide it. The bunks and pods that the human crew slept in were not really designed for his physiology. Besides that, though there hadn't been any complaints about his presence, there was a good chance most of the crew would prefer not to sleep in proximity to a turian. Keeping him separate might prevent a bevy of future problems.

She waited, therefore, for something to happen. The only thing that did was that Mordin entered her office during the day shift, presented her with a small electronic device, and left while she was still drawing breath to ask what he was doing. She took a closer look at the object and frowned. It was a Cerberus-issued surveillance device, one of the better variety. A quick check revealed that he'd disabled all of the other surveillance in the science lab. Vakarian seemed to have removed everything from the main battery, as well, and he was probably the one who'd gone through Shepard's quarters, too.

So that was how it was going to be. Miranda had been waiting for someone to make a move, and apparently this was it. She could replace the devices, of course, but they could remove the new ones just as easily. Perhaps, for now, she should let it go, and see how matters developed.

What was more irritating was that Shepard had given EDI orders not to report anything she considered a private conversation, and had herself supplied EDI with her definition of "private." Miranda had already sent a request to EDI's programmers to have the commands overriden—surely it had been an oversight that kept her from freely accessing the AI's cameras and audio pickups—but she had yet to receive a response. She certainly did not expect to have her hand held, but she did not like the sense that her reports and recommendations were disappearing into a void.

Miranda fired off another crisply worded message and went on with her day. As usual, she finished her morning workout routine and arrived in the mess hall early enough to avoid most of the pre-day-shift traffic there. She needed to eat a lot to sustain her biotic's metabolism, and her experience was that most subordinates were taken aback by the sight of her consuming the quantities of calories she required. She disliked the stares and the whispered comments about how she kept her figure.

She had no sooner seated herself, however, than Vakarian emerged from the battery. Miranda eyed him covertly as he strode down the corridor. He paused for a bare second on seeing her and spared her a nod before rummaging through the galley for his own packaged rations.

She had not seen much of him in the few days since he'd been aboard. He'd emerged for a few minor missions—he already seemed to be a fixture on Shepard's ground team—and for the occasional meal. He seemed to keep odd hours, and Miranda wasn't quite sure if it was a normal turian sleep cycle, or if he was being affected by his injuries. He was moving easily enough, however, and all of the after-action reports, from Shepard, Jacob, and Massani, indicated him to be fully capable. Shepard's reports, in fact, were bluntly honest; she'd even truthfully admitted to sending sensitive Cerberus data to the Alliance. Perhaps she had decided there was no point in concealing that truth, since EDI was aware of it. EDI had also copied the data to Cerberus before sending it as Shepard ordered, but there was no reason to inform Shepard of that.

Shepard did appear to prefer having the turian on her ground team, but that was understandable, since they'd worked together before. Miranda rather wished Shepard would make more use of the other personnel available—including herself—but it was important to give the commander her operational autonomy. She eyed Vakarian curiously as he moved about the galley.

"How are you settling in?" Miranda inquired.

Vakarian stopped short on being addressed, and gave her an inscrutable look through his ever-present visor. "Can't complain. Except about the rations, I suppose."

"Put a request in with Gardner. We can acquire better supplies if there's anything you need."

His mandibles flared out once. "Hadn't expected you to care."

"I want all mission personnel to be performing optimally." Miranda took a bite of her reconstituted eggs. Not comparable to fresh, sadly, but adequate for her needs. "Creature comforts are a small price to pay."

"Hm." The turian took a seat at her table, with a kind of cautious precision, and cracked open his rations.

They ate in silence for a few minutes, not quite companionable. Vakarian's posture was casual enough, and he appeared focused on his meal rather than on her, but Miranda suspected he was assessing her, even as she did the same to him. Her suspicion was confirmed when he said, "Can I ask you a question?"

She swallowed her mouthful of toast. "Certainly."

"Why are you with Cerberus?"

Miranda put her fork down while she considered that one. Some of her reasons were far more personal than she was willing to share. "Cerberus isn't what you think," she began.

"You don't know what I think," he countered.

She gave him a practiced, tolerant smile. "No? I imagine I can guess. You're accustomed to thinking of Cerberus as a terrorist organization. We're really very little different than an elite asari commando unit, or STG. We seek the advancement of humanity—economically, scientifically, culturally. The Alliance is too cautious to do what needs to be done. So we do."

"The advancement of humanity," he repeated. "At whose expense?"

She let her shoulders rise and fall. "We don't necessarily seek to oust current galactic leadership. We merely seek to make our own place in the galaxy. Why should we be held back by political accords and arrangements we never had a part in creating? If humanity can create better ideas, better strategies, better technology than currently exists, why shouldn't we do so, and make the most of it?"

"Hmm." Vakarian toyed with a fork, which looked small and awkward in his three-fingered hand. He wore gloves even to eat, she noted. "I assume then you wouldn't consider yourself a xenophobe."

"Absolutely not." Miranda leaned forward. "I have respect for what the other species have accomplished, and I can certainly respect aliens as individuals. I can respect your skills and experience, for example."

"Thank you," he said, dry as dust.

She pressed on. "But you're not naive. You've seen how the world operates. I happen to believe humanity isn't going to get anywhere by sitting by and waiting for the Council to hand us things. We have to work for our own betterment, any way that we can."

"At a high cost," he said.

"Everything has a cost."

He shook his head, though he didn't break eye contact. "I mean the lives of your own people. That Alliance admiral—Kahoku. We saw his body. We saw experiments with husks, rachni, the Thorian, thresher maws. All human experimental subjects, with considerable loss of life. Alliance marines and isolated colonies picked off and used for Cerberus's purposes."

She wondered for a moment if Shepard had put him up to this. She'd expected these questions from the commander herself, but she hadn't done more than make veiled allusions to any of these events. "I'm not privy to the details of all these projects."

His gaze suddenly sharpened. "I was informed you had studied Shepard's background intensively."

"I have. I mean that I'm not privy to the details on the Cerberus side. I'm aware of Shepard's reports and conclusions, but they may not be entirely accurate. Every organization has its bad apples, Vakarian. Its failures. Sometimes a project gets out of control. It's not the fault of the entire organization."

His mandibles pressed flat against his jaw, and his head tilted forward. "What about the superiors who allowed those abuses to happen? Especially more than once? Once you have enough failures, it begins to look like a systemic problem, Lawson."

Her spine prickled with the very beginnings of a biotic surge. Miranda forced down her defensive response and leaned back in her chair, putting on another practiced smile. "As I said, I'm not privy to the details of those operations. Cerberus allows considerable autonomy to its project leaders. That sometimes yields great success, and sometimes great failure."

"Great success?" he asked, and it wasn't hard for her to read the sarcasm heavy in his voice.

Her smile stretched. "The Lazarus Project, for one. I assure you, it wasn't easy to bring Commander Shepard back from the dead."

Vakarian continued staring at her, his posture rigid, although he wasn't showing his teeth. Finally, he settled back in his own seat and rolled his shoulders, his posture relaxing. "Thanks for answering my question."

"It's no trouble." She returned to her meal. "Why did you ask?"

"You're clearly intelligent and capable. You must have had other career options."

Her smile stiffened for a moment. There had been fewer options than he might imagine—or, at least, fewer with the resources to keep Henry Lawson away from her. "I joined Cerberus because they will act in humanity's best interests." That much was true, at least, even if not the whole truth. He didn't need the whole truth.

"Mm." He poked at his rations.

"You have to admit they're willing to do more about the missing colonies than the Alliance."

"True," he admitted. "That doesn't cancel out everything else."

Miranda frowned, noticing that other crew were beginning to trickle into the mess hall, and she hadn't yet finished her breakfast. Gardner had taken his place in the galley, and Hadley and Matthews came along soon after. She took another, larger, bite. Vakarian was doing the same, she saw, out of the corner of her eye.

She ate quickly, but she still hadn't quite finished when Jacob took the seat next to her, his own plate loaded. She felt a brief flash of jealousy. No one ever seemed taken aback by the quantity of food that he ate. "Morning, Miranda," he said, digging in with gusto.

She swallowed her mouthful. "Good morning, Jacob."

"Saw the plans for that cannon you want to build, Vakarian. That's going to pack a wallop."

"That's the plan," the turian replied, relaxing a fraction. Miranda wondered if he'd grilled Jacob about his allegiance, as well. "I saw the reports about the ship that hit the old _Normandy_. We definitely need better guns going up against something like that."

"Amen to that," Jacob said with a grin. "Besides, bigger guns are always better, right?"

Vakarian shrugged, his mandibles opening up in the semblance of a smile. "I don't know about _always_, but most of the time, yeah."

The mess hall was beginning to fill, though Shepard hadn't yet made an appearance. A glance at her omni-tool revealed that she already had a dozen messages waiting at her terminal. Miranda forced down the last few bites of her breakfast and departed.

Part of her wanted to resume the argument, perhaps see if Jacob would add some bolstering arguments. Ridiculous, really. What did it matter if she convinced one turian?

She knew the answer, though. Because he had Shepard's ear, and Shepard relied on him.

It was much too early in the morning for a headache, but Miranda felt one coming on all the same.


	4. Chapter 4

Miranda was meticulous about her reports. Those she sent to the Illusive Man were detailed yet concise. She prided herself on her ability to relate the salient developments of each mission, along with evaluating the Commander and the rest of the team. So far, she was cautiously optimistic about their progress. She could state with confidence that Shepard was both physically and mentally sound. Enough for combat, at least. It remained to be seen how well she could pull the crew together and accomplish their major mission. She'd been stable except when Vakarian was injured, however. Miranda frowned, considering that. Archangel's identity was unanticipated. She'd included an irritated note about their researcher's thoroughness in her last report. Her own plan had been for Shepard to learn to rely on unfamiliar personnel, particularly herself and Jacob. It still galled her a little that Vakarian had managed to elude Cerberus' initial searches for him. Moreover, he was proving frustratingly opaque. He had deftly dodged Kelly Chambers' attempts to engage him in an evaluative interview. Of course, he wasn't alone there. Solus had, according to Kelly, gone on regarding neuroscience and best psychiatric practice for nearly an hour before sending her away, and Massani had merely regaled her with war stories, each more gruesome than the last.

The AI's voice interrupted her thoughts. "Operative Lawson, you asked me to inform you when Shepard had returned from Alchera. She has now returned."

"Thank you, EDI."

Miranda was not best pleased with whomever in the Alliance had decided that Shepard should be informed of the location of the wreck. Did they have no idea how delicate her psychological state might be? No matter how stable she seemed, visiting the crash site could have unpredictable results. Anderson had to have a hand in it; she knew Shepard had made contact with him, and it was the first time she'd truly been tempted to erase a message before Shepard read it. Sending her to the place of her death might not have been his bright idea, she supposed; he might have simply passed Shepard's location on to someone else in Alliance command. Whoever had done it, it was infuriating Alliance meddling, entirely typical. They couldn't be bothered to do anything effective about the disappearing colonies, but throw a wrench into Miranda's mission and destabilize her charge? Yes. That, they could do, and whatever happened to Shepard as a result, Miranda would have to sort out.

She left her office and headed down to the shuttle bay. She felt a rush of annoyance to find that Vakarian had reached Shepard ahead of her. She supposed she shouldn't have been surprised.

"You didn't have to go down there alone, Shepard. I would have gone with you," he was saying.

Shepard was looking down at the round object in her hands. "You would have hated it." She looked up and flashed a smile at the turian. "It was awfully cold down there."

He let out a short bark of laughter, which sounded strained to Miranda's ear. "You don't say."

"Yeah. Really quite frigid. I have it on good authority that turians don't like the cold."

"Well. That was considerate of you, then."

"That's me. I have my crew's best interests at heart. The Mako's down there, did you know?"

"Really?" He rubbed the side of his neck. "Damn. All the hours I spent on that thing..."

Shepard grinned. "Think you could get it running again?"

Vakarian laughed again. "Please, Shepard. I have enough to do getting the ship's cannon in shape."

They started toward the elevator, and Miranda, side by side. Miranda was struck by the contrast between them; Shepard was a tall and athletic woman, but Vakarian was still at least half a head taller, and bulkier, especially in that heavy armor. Shepard didn't look _small_, precisely—Miranda wasn't sure she could ever look small—but she certainly looked smaller. They were a peculiar pair, walking together with a loose, matched stride, in spite of their different physiology. Miranda pursed her lips, wondering what had drawn the disaffected detective and humanity's best soldier together. All the testimony she'd seen from the previous mission indicated that the two had been friendly, but didn't give her enough insight into why. There was a great deal of _why_ to Shepard that she didn't understand. Why she had not yet confronted Miranda directly, for example, in spite of sliding around Cerberus's strictures whenever she could. It was not the behavior Miranda would have expected, given the woman's records, in combat or out of it.

Shepard and Vakarian stopped short when they saw her. "Miranda," Shepard said with a nod. "Did you need something?"

"Not at all. I just thought I'd see how the mission had gone."

Shepard's expression tightened. She looked down again at what she carried, and Miranda realized with a sudden chill that it was her old helmet. She remembered seeing it when they'd first come to Alchera for the retrieval, but in the absence of Shepard's body, it had seemed too inconsequential to take.

Shepard said, "Well enough. The Alliance asked if I could find the dog tags of the deceased crew." She held up one hand, showing the fistful of chains she carried. "Got them all."

Miranda ignored the way Vakarian was glaring at her, as if he could put a round through her head by sheer force of will. "I see. Anything else to report?"

The turian's glare intensified, but Shepard didn't react to it, either, shrugging. "Managed to salvage a few materials."

"I'll have someone unload them from the shuttle."

"Thanks."

For a moment, the three of them stood in an awkward triangle. Shepard was focused on the battered helmet cradled in her arms. Vakarian was still glaring at Miranda; if she was any judge, he was only a hair's breadth from hustling Shepard past her and into the elevator. "And how are you, Shepard?" she asked.

Shepard looked at her with a brief flash of surprise. "I'm all right." She started toward the elevator, leaving Miranda and Vakarian both little choice but to fall in beside her. Once the door closed behind them, she tapped the helmet idly. "Looks like I'm lucky to be alive."

"We had some fortunate turns," Miranda said briskly. The primary piece of luck, in all honesty, being that her central nervous system had been intact. Shepard had never inquired about the details, however, and this hardly seemed the time to bring them up.

Vakarian was still giving her an odd look, perhaps now more puzzled than irritated. Miranda kept her attention on Shepard. It didn't particularly matter if he understood her. Perhaps she was not particularly moved by the fate of the late _Normandy_'s crew, but she recognized that Shepard was. Miranda had, after all, read every scrap of documentation regarding the events on Mindoir. The trauma was crucial to Shepard's psychology, in her opinion. It was no surprise that the fate of the colonists, and of her crew, were important to her.

She watched Shepard out of the corner of her eye. She was gazing down at the helmet again before shaking her head and shifting it to the side, bracing it against her hip. "Eezo, mostly," Shepard said.

Miranda blinked. "Excuse me?"

"The salvage. Mostly refined eezo."

Miranda refocused. "Ah. Excellent. We may be able to look into some amp upgrades."

"Let's discuss the specs tomorrow." Shepard sounded entirely normal. If she was distressed, she was hiding it well, and Miranda didn't think she was that skilled an actress. Good. Perhaps the Alliance's little memorial wouldn't create problems, after all.

#

Garrus knew it was Shepard as soon as the doors slid open—not just because hardly anyone else bothered to come into the battery, but because of the particular cadence of her step. This time, though, instead of asking if he could spare a minute, Shepard said, "You know, I could fire Lawson and make you XO."

Garrus's shoulders tensed. He looked down at the glowing calculations on the screen of his console. The battery was comfortably warm, the equipment humming at a frequency which drowned out the more discordant noises of the human crew elsewhere on the ship. It was a perfectly situated place to work quietly, without being disturbed. Disturbed by anyone by Shepard, at any rate. He was used to her daily rounds from the first _Normandy_, but lately, if there wasn't a ground mission, she was likely to stop by more than once a day. He couldn't always predict when. Usually she just checked in, maybe exchanged a few pleasantries, and left him to his work. She hadn't asked any more questions about Omega, at least. He was grateful for that. It was too near and too distant, all at once. Here on the _Normandy_, Omega and its grit and stench seemed almost unreal, and yet, when he had a spare minute, he went back over those last weeks in his mind, looking for the signs he should have seen, the ones he'd missed at the time.

He'd been quiet too long, probably. He straightened, lifting his head, and forced himself to keep his tone light. "Rather not deal with the paperwork, if it's all the same to you."

She let out a short laugh. "Somehow I thought you'd say that."

Garrus laughed briefly and turned around. Shepard stood watching him with her arms crossed. She was smiling, but there was a faint vertical line between her eyebrows. Seemed like he'd been seeing that expression on her face more often than he remembered it occurring back on the SR-1. "Miranda seems more the paperwork type."

Her mouth turned up more on one side. "You're right about that. The reports she sends me could be framed and used as models."

"Can I ask you something?"

Her eyebrows went up. "Of course."

"How far do you trust her?" As far as he could tell, the two humans had a certain tension between them, barely concealed by politeness. Unless he missed his guess badly, Lawson was not pleased about having to defer to Shepard's judgment on this mission.

Shepard sighed and took a seat on the supply crate, leaning back against the wall. "Let me ask you something first. What do you think of her?"

Garrus considered that. He was mildly surprised she'd bothered asking, but his assessment came readily enough. "She's obviously intelligent. A strong biotic. Very efficient. Businesslike. She's also got the Cerberus line down pat. She's probably a very effective recruiter. Why do you ask?"

Shepard nodded. "I agree. She's highly competent, very intelligent, and invested in the success of the mission. I have no doubt that she'll do her job, and do it well. The problem is, I'm fairly sure her job entails spying on me. Those surveillance devices we pulled have to be going somewhere, and I know she sends reports to the Illusive Man. She hasn't bothered to hide that. Of the entire crew, she's clearly the most loyal to Cerberus."

"Most of them are loyal to Cerberus," Garrus observed.

Shepard frowned. "No one's been giving you shit, though, right?"

Garrus waved her off. "No. Relax. I told you before, everyone's being polite. I don't know that everyone _likes_ that I'm here, but they're all coping with it."

"Hm." She was still frowning, but she said, "Whatever the rest of them think, Miranda's a true believer, and she may be the only one highly placed enough to know much about Cerberus's other activities. Hell, half of this crew only signed on with Cerberus in the last six months. I've been asking. They were brought in specifically for this mission, I think."

Ah. Of course Shepard had been using her usual rounds to gain intel about their adversaries, Cerberus included. "Do you think the Illusive Man would even allow you to replace Lawson?" Garrus asked, curious.

Her expression smoothed out, turning thoughtful. "I don't know. It would be interesting to find out. Useful to know how long my leash is. But I'm not sure it's worth pissing Miranda off or disrupting the crew. The Cerberus personnel don't always like her, but they respect her." She shrugged. "An XO doesn't need to be liked. She's good at the logistics and she's running the crew effectively. That's enough for now."

Garrus hesitated. Part of him didn't even want to ask the next question, but curiosity prevailed. "So... you weren't serious, then."

"I wanted to see what you thought about it." She stood up, her green eyes very intent on him. "I also wanted you to know that I trust you. There are reasons not to change the current arrangement, but if I had complete latitude to choose my own crew, you'd be my first choice. I didn't want you to think I don't have confidence in you."

If he were a better turian, affirmation from his superior officer should have been exactly what he wanted to hear, straightening his spine, filling him with pride. Instead, Shepard stood there, poised and earnest and focused on him, and mostly what he felt was a dull surge of resentment. He knew very well what she was doing. He didn't need her damned pep talk. It was the same tone of voice she'd used talking to Williams, back in the day. She didn't get it, did she? He'd told her the story—as much of it as he could stand—and she still thought she could fix things with an earnest look and encouraging words. Maybe it was because she never would have failed the way he had.

He looked away, turning back to the console. "I wasn't worried about promotion, Shepard. You know I've got your six. That's enough." He hoped it would be enough, anyway. Combat, at least, was simple. Simple decisions, especially with Shepard giving the orders. Backing her up was one thing he'd always been good at.

In his peripheral vision, he saw her take a step closer, but he didn't turn to look at her. At least he still had peripheral vision. He cleared his throat. "Do you need something else, Shepard?"

He thought she frowned, but all she said was, "I'll leave you to your work, then."

#

As the entrance to Jarrahe station locked behind the three of them, and the VI began droning a contamination warning, Vakarian said, "Well, that's not good."

Finding little humor in the situation, Miranda shot him a look that would have quelled most of her subordinates. The turian, of course, ignored it, and Shepard laughed. "Your sterling observational skills never fail to impress me, Garrus."

"That's what I'm here for."

"Thought you said you were here to pretty the place up."

"That, too. Don't forget providing some shooting accuracy on this operation, either."

"How could I?"

Miranda turned away, flicking through all the frequencies on her comm unit. EDI had traced a batch of defective mechs to this station. They'd been prepared for more hostile mechs, but not the station VI. Foolish, in hindsight. She wasn't sure it was wise to be so set on tracing the problem to its origins, but that wasn't her primary irritant at the moment. She hadn't been groundside with both Shepard and Vakarian since he'd come on board. Their ability to banter about nothing more than their own excellence was already grating on her nerves.

"Comms are jammed," said Shepard, coming up behind Miranda. "I don't know what you're talking about, Garrus. I'm a good shot."

He snorted. "Please, Shepard. You favor a shotgun."

"Don't forget my new best friend, the Carnifex." Shepard patted the holstered pistol.

"Of course, lately you seem to favor just throwing yourself at the enemy."

"What can I say? It works."

It did not take much imagination to understand what had happened here. The bodies and the VI's continued warnings told the story: the VI system had become compromised, its self-defense protocol had viewed the human inhabitants of the station as a threat, and it had responded with lethal measures. At any moment, it might choose to do the same to them—the VI didn't need weapons when it controlled life support systems, making all the guns they carried next to useless. Miranda did not consider herself a fearful person, but the idea of being asphyxiated on this damned station made her breath come a little short. She deliberately took deep, slow breaths to prevent any kind of panic reaction. She also watched Shepard out of the corner of her eye. If the commander were equally perturbed, she managed not to show it. She sauntered about, her heavy armor clanking, her eyes flicking about rapidly, taking everything in as they explored the dark and—apparently—depopulated station.

The VI locked the doors of the crew quarters behind them as soon as they entered. Miranda's breath caught again, expecting some more lethal measure to follow.

Nothing happened. They all stood poised, but the section was quiet. Vakarian sighed and moved toward one of the doors, bending to look at the lock.

"Well," said Shepard brightly. "Let's see if we can do anything with the power over here." She moved to the console at the center of the room.

Miranda took another deep breath and followed the turian's lead, turning to the second door out of the room.

An hour later, her back ached and she was still working at the lock.

"I wish Tali were here," Vakarian muttered.

"Come on, don't tell me you can't hack that," Shepard said.

He twisted his head around to glare at her. "It's changing the encryption as fast as I'm hacking, and the power keeps cutting out."

Miranda was having equally poor luck with the other lock. It was infuriating. She didn't feel the need to complain ceaselessly about it, however.

"Tali might not do any better, then." Shepard frowned at the station schematic displayed on the terminal she'd managed to access, and tapped at the control interface.

"Yeah, but you know how she loves going up against rogue VIs."

In spite of herself, Miranda snorted.

"Problem?" Shepard poked the interface again.

"No," Miranda said. "I was just reflecting that there aren't many who could count fighting rogue VIs as a habit."

Vakarian laughed, to Miranda's surprise. Shepard chuckled. "That's true. Lucky bastards."

"Oh, they don't know what they're missing out on," he said.

Shepard tapped the interface again.

"Five doors open," droned the VI, as all the visible locks in that wing of the station turned green.

"There we go!" Shepard proclaimed.

Vakarian stood from his crouched position. His mandibles flared. "How did you do that?"

Shepard shrugged. "I just moved things around."

Miranda straightened herself, stretching out her back, and activated the door. The other two followed her, still bickering.

"What do you mean, you moved things around?"

"I don't know. I fiddled some settings and I think I confused the VI."

"You have no finesse at all!"

"I never said I did."

Vakarian let out an exasperated sigh. "I just don't understand how you get results like that from brute force."

"Does it matter?" Miranda asked. "At least we got out of there."

"See?" said Shepard. "Results, Garrus."

He grumbled something under his breath that Miranda didn't catch.

They worked their way through the rest of the station, getting themselves trapped again, in the labs this time, as they went. Shepard had managed to manipulate the lab's experiment so that the VI was forced to shut down power and unlock the door, prompting Vakarian to reminisce, at some length, about an incident with a mining laser. While it was clear that what they needed to do was access the room housing the VI core so they could shut it down, they needed to find and reroute power from every wing of the station to counter the VI's control measures. It was taking an irritatingly long time, and Miranda still half-feared the oxygen would simply cut out before they managed to shut the thing down. Vakarian and Shepard's constant chatter was not improving her mood any.

"I think we're going to need to access the power in engineering," Shepard said.

"Brute forcing it again," Vakarian replied.

Shepard spread her hands. "We've been everywhere else on the station. It's the only thing we have left to try."

Vakarian crossed his arms and huffed out a breath. Miranda grimaced. Shepard was right, and doubtless Vakarian realized that as well. Unfortunately... "Shepard, there's plasma venting in engineering."

"Yeah, I know." She stood at the entrance to the section and watched the jets spray out of the walls, her expression thoughtful. "I think I can make it."

Vakarian's mandibles flared. "What?"

Miranda said, "That's not a good idea, Shepard. You could be killed." The last thing they needed was to lose her on an inessential task like this.

Shepard turned to face them, rubbing the back of her neck. "You gave me this fancy new implant, Miranda. I think I can zip through there, if I time it right. And if they do catch me—" She smiled, but Miranda thought it looked strained. "—well, I can regrow skin, right?"

"Your augmentations include a limited degree of self-healing," Miranda admitted. "I still don't think it's a good idea."

"It's a terrible idea," Vakarian said, practically growling.

"I have a better shot at it than either of you," Shepard said. "Does anyone have a better idea? Because I don't know how much longer it will be before the VI does something drastic."

She looked expectantly from one to the other. Miranda's lips compressed. No, she didn't have a better idea. The lack still didn't make Shepard's idea a _good_ one. She glanced at the turian. His mandibles were shifting in and out, his head tipped down. She didn't think he liked the prospect any better than she did. "We can't even communicate with you with comms out," she pointed out.

"I know. It shouldn't take long, though. All right," Shepard said, turning back to the corridor leading to the engineering section. "Here I go." She paused briefly; then her fist clenched and she shot down the corridor in a haze of blue. "So far so good!" she shouted, and disappeared around the corner.

Vakarian let out a long breath. Miranda began counting out a mental estimate of how long it might take Shepard to reach and activate the power in engineering. It was too quiet, now, with comms out. She crossed her arms and found herself drumming her fingers against her arm. Was it growing warmer? Her breath was coming a little faster and shallower. She deliberately slowed down and activated her omni-tool to check the local atmosphere.

"Oxygen levels are fine," said Vakarian.

Miranda looked up. "Excuse me?"

He pointed at his targeting visor. "I've been monitoring conditions. The VI hasn't decided to pull the plug on us yet."

Miranda dismissed the tool's holographic interface. "Why didn't you say something?"

"I didn't want to draw Shepard's attention to it."

Miranda considered that, starting as realization struck home. "You've been distracting her on purpose."

He shrugged, crossing his arms again as he looked toward the corridor where Shepard had disappeared. "Did she tell you she remembers dying?"

"I'd gathered as much," Miranda said, remembering Shepard's complaint about the viewport in her quarters.

He blew out a quiet breath, but made no further comment. Miranda had always found turians difficult to read; their expressions were so alien compared to human faces, all ridges and angles. The stiff bandage and livid wounds marring the side of his face turned toward her made his even more difficult. Still, she thought she could safely call his mood _bleak_. The absence of his and Shepard's chatter now loomed large, the silence ringing in her ears.

Abruptly, the jets venting down the corridor stopped. A few moments later, Shepard came jogging back, a wide grin on her face. "Miss me?"

Miranda couldn't help but let out a sigh of relief. Vakarian frowned at Shepard. "You're hurt."

She did have a blistered burn streaking across one cheek and scorch marks on her armor, but Shepard dismissed his concern. "I mis-timed a run. Don't worry about it, it's already healing up."

After that, deactivating the VI was no trouble. Miranda was glad to get on the shuttle and leave the place behind her. Vakarian and Shepard went back to chattering aimlessly with each other, though she thought his eyes stayed on that healing burn on her cheek. She filed the information away. The turian didn't give away much, but when it came to Shepard... well. It was an interesting degree of protectiveness from a subordinate.


End file.
